No Subject

[Steve VanDevender <stevev@efn.org>]

Rex Lessa Timothy writes:
 > I think we should use Java instead of SGI-scripts. They have the advantage
 > that people from all platforms (DOS, Mac, Unix) can program them, so we have
 > more independance.
 > Besides that, Java(script) is clearly something that will overrule SGI in
 > the futere (with a few exceptions of course).
 > I'm quite sure that in half a year, almost everyone has a Java-compatible
 > browser, those that haven't are probably not interested enough (You can get
 > it for free for almost all platforms, and installation is almost without
 > problems).
 > 
 > Timothy

Do you mean CGI (Common Gateway Interface) instead of SGI (Silicon
Graphics, Incorporated)?

Having worked with CGI a fair amount and knowing more or less what Java
is, I can't agree at all with your proposition.  While you can do a lot
of neat things with Java applets, they are by no means a complete
replacement for CGI -- most importantly, because Java applets run on
your computer rather than on the web server, there are things that would
be easy to do with CGI that would be almost impossible to do with Java.
Certainly, the converse is also true; you can do things in Java that are
almost impossible to do with CGI.

Probably the most useful thing you can do with CGI is search databases
on a server or do other computation- or data-intensive tasks that would
be impractical on a typical personal computer.  I can't see any
efficient way to do that using Java applets.  You won't see Alta Vista
(http://www.altavista.digital.com/) implemented as a Java applet any
time soon.

I also happen to believe that the Web is not just for people with
Netscape or other graphical browsers.  I can't tell you how disgusted I
am dealing with "Netscape-enhanced" pages or pages that work only in
graphical browsers.